[TW: Talk of fecal matter, strong language, sarcasm, and frustration]
Some days, I swear the doggie updates are far and few in-between.
Most of them, though, come with puns, or frustrations, and I do mean frustrations. For the past few weeks, the doggies have been in lock down, and they have been hating it. By that, I mean that one of the big summer storms knocked out one of our fence panels. This left a massive gap that the dogs easily just walk right out of. They then wander the neighborhood unsupervised if they wanted to. That’s a huge no-no, right? Right.
So, instead of just hillbilly rigging this thing back together with chewing gum and paperclips- [I’m joking, we’re not from that part of the sticks.] we obviously needed a little time to put together the correct tools, supplies, etc. in order to do this the right way, so it’d last, just like when my grandfather put the fence up 40+ years ago. Right? Common sense and all.
Now, in that time frame, we’ve been watching these two dogs with hawk’s eyes because, the one time we weren’t a rabbit was in the yard, and both dogs decided to take off after it into the neighbor’s yard, through the hole in the fence. Now, no dogs or rabbits were harmed but, you best believe we were not pleased by this outcome, and both were punished, and lectured from here to high heaven once they were gotten back into the house.
Also in that very same time frame, Luna has come up with this wonderful [insert sarcasm here] habit of rolling in shit. Now, it doesn’t seem to matter if it’s her own shit, or her older doggie brother, Bear’s shit, bird shit, raccoon shit, you name it. All that seems to matter at this point, is that if you look away from her for too many seconds at a time, while she’s outside because, she will then roll herself- similarly to what I imagine an alligator death roll is like- until her entire body is then coated in the nastiest shit she can find in the yard, and then she will trot inside happy as a clam, and show herself off like the prize winning pig at the county fair. This is a problem for multiple reasons.
Firstly, the smell. I’m not sure if you’ve ever smelled a shit-caked dog, and I don’t think I’d wish that upon even my worst enemy at this point but, as someone who has had to deal with this four times this week, not even my worst enemy needs to deal with this. It is becoming ridiculous. I cannot become desensitized to it. Each time is worse than the last. Secondly, if not caught soon enough, she will rub up against every porous surface known to man. Blankets, couches, walls, carpets, you name it. Do you like scrubbing shit off wallpaper and paint? What about off of carpets, or rugs? No? Us either. Thirdly, she does not in any way need to be coating herself in shit. I get it, okay? From a scientific standpoint, dogs coat themselves in the stinky thing that they think is great, and they want to bring that back to the pack, which is us, and they want to show that to us but, we don’t know what that is. We don’t know what’s in that, or if anything in the poop could make her, or us, or anyone around us ill, so letting her stay covered in poo isn’t an option either. Make sense? Finally? *Cringe.*
We’re at a wee bit of a stand-off on the topic of poop, to say the least.
Now, Luna is once again on lock down because despite taking her outside a thousand times a day to potty, play, train, and whatnot, she cannot be trusted with unfettered doggie door access because chances are she will come back inside covered in shit, and that’s just not okay. She hates it but, I hate bathing her even more because, it doesn’t matter that she isn’t getting washed with a cold hose, she still acts like she is dying every time. No matter the fact that one of her humans is in a bathing suit, sitting in the bottom of the tub, while comfortably warm water is sprayed nicely from a detachable showerhead, while the other human lathers her up and rinses her off before she gets toweled off nicely, she still whines, cries, and shrieks her displeasure to the world… only to return shitty again within the next 18-hours.
The cycle is a horrible one.
Despite our lack of updates, my little Lulu is honestly thriving; and I wish I took more photos and videos but, I only have two hands, and I wish I knew how some of the other handlers did it! PA work is going so well, and I have no complaints when it comes down to that. She is consistently alerting to migraines, dizzy spells, and panic attacks. She still has moments of confusion but, that is why she is a service dog in training [SDiT] and not a full-blown service dog and will not be expected to perform full and consistent service work until she’s older, and ready for it.
Right now, our main concerns are training, consistency, and building a bond with Luna to make sure we’re a good handler team. Hopefully, staying out of poop is also on that list. [If it isn’t, I may need to task train her to go find toilet paper.]
So, here’s my question to you, if you have a service animal, who trained them? Were you able to get your service animal through a program? If you did get your service animal through a program, were you able to get crowdfunding, or afford to pay for the program outright, or were you able to get a scholarship program? Were you able to get your service animal through a nonprofit organization? I know I was approved to be on the wait-list for IlliniService Dogs, a nonprofit organization, however, their wait-list is between 1-5 years based on need, and since I need a multipurpose service animal, I could be on the tail end of that spectrum. Or did you go the owner trained route? If so, did you owner train your service animal entirely by yourself, or did you go through some puppy classes, and intermediate work?
Right now, we’re taking a bit of a hybrid approach. Luna will be going through puppy classes, we’re also looking at getting her into TOPS, a local program to us, and if we can’t get her in there, there’s a couple of other government funded programs near me who do accept rescue animals to be service dogs if they prove to have natural talent, and the correct temperaments to be service animals. As stated in past posts, Luna alerts to migraines, panic attacks, dizzy spells, and can lead me to the car during moments of brain fog. Out of all of these things, the only one we’ve taught her is “find car.” Somehow, it came in her olfactory settings how to tell me I was going to have a migraine, be dizzy, and that either myself or A was going to have a panic attack. She’s really a very good dog. A pain in the ass at times, as I fear most puppies –and children if we’re being wholly and totally honest here- are but, you know what, that’s okay. Even I, myself have bad days, everyone does.
And in the meantime, we’re going to keep working on things like, picking up dropped items, getting a bag full of rescue meds, or simply a bag of medications, light bracing, protecting my bad leg while we’re out in public and I have my cane [she’s great at this one!] We’ve come such a long way from the skinny, scared little pup that first came into our home, who didn’t understand what it meant to have access to a doggie door, or so much water all the time, or this kind of food, these many toys, or enrichment activities, etc. Luna has also started teaching herself how to wake us up from nightmares, all on her own by using the same “Touch” command we already use for alerting migraines and panic attacks.
I couldn’t be prouder of her if I tried.
Some days are hard but, we persevere.
As for Mr. Bear, he is not enjoying the backlash of Hurricane Helene, even up in Illinois were getting some harsh winds, a bit of rain, and some whacky temperatures. His arthritis is acting up, and it’s been harsh on his joints, as well as mine. Some nights, he doesn’t want to come downstairs and sleep in the basement with us, and he just wants to lay upstairs, on one of the dog beds up there. Some nights he doesn’t. It really just depends on his mood lately. I hate that my sweet little old man is just that, getting old. However, I do hope that everyone out there, is staying safe, especially with the hurricane. I’ve been keeping up with the updates on Facebook and TikTok, as people often do, and all I can say is that I hope my own family members out there are staying safe, as well as my friends, and readers, and your friends and family as well. My thoughts go out to all of you.
At some point, I plan to get a writing schedule back up and running but, I don’t know what that’ll be as of yet. For now, I feel like I’ve rambled enough. Happy Coffee Day, everyone, may your coffee be strong, and the fuckery be short today.
-Sky
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